Occurrence and outcome of COVID-19 in AIRD patients on concomitant treatment with Tofacitinib- results from KRA COVID COHORT (KRACC) subset

• Published in: BMC rheumatology Vol. 7; no. 1; p. 22
• Main Authors: Chebbi, Pramod, Shobha, Vineeta, Rao, Vijay K, Haridas, Vikram, Janardana, Ramya, Pinto, Benzeeta, Kumar, Sharath, Patil, Abhishek, Tekkatte, Roopa, Salanke, Manasa, Mahendranath, K M
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England BioMed Central 26.07.2023; BMC
• Subjects: Autoimmune rheumatic diseases; Body mass index; Concomitant tofacitinib treatment; Covid-19; COVID-19 vaccines; Lung diseases; Mortality; SARS-CoV-2 infection; India; SARS-CoV-2 infection; Concomitant tofacitinib treatment; Covid-19; Autoimmune rheumatic diseases
• ISSN: 2520-1026; 2520-1026
• DOI: 10.1186/s41927-023-00345-8

We assessed the risk factors and outcome of COVID-19 in patients with autoimmune rheumatic diseases(AIRD) who contracted infection while on background treatment with tofacitinib. This is a non-interventional, cross-sectional, questionnaire based telephonic study which included consecutive AIRD patients on tofacitinib co-treatment. Data related to the AIRD subset, disease modifying anti rheumatic drugs(DMARDs) including glucocorticoids and comorbidities, was collected from 7 rheumatology centers across Karnataka during the second wave of COVID-19 pandemic. The information about COVID-19 occurrence and COVID-19 vaccination was recorded. During the study period (Jun-July 2021), 335 AIRD patients (80.6% female) on treatment with tofacitinib were included. The mean duration of tofacitinib use was 3.4+/-3.1months. Thirty-six(10.75%) patients developed COVID-19. Diabetes mellitus (p = 0.04 (OR 2.60 (1.13-5.99)) was identified as a risk factor for COVID-19 in our cohort. Almost half of our cohort was COVID-19 vaccinated with at least one dose, with resultant decline in incidence of COVID-19(OR 0.15 (0.06-0.39) among the vaccinated. Recovery amongst COVID-19 infection group was 91.2%. The subset of AIRD patients who were on treatment with tofacitinib were found to have a higher rate of COVID-19 infection as compared to our KRACC cohort. Pre-existing comorbidity of diabetes mellitus was the significant risk factor in our cohort. This subset of the KRACC cohort shows RA patients had a lesser infection and PsA patients had a higher infection.